First Annual “5forCHOP” Run: May 21

There is a new 5 Mile race in Philly, and it is going to support an amazing cause. The 1st Annual “5forCHOP” Run is set for Saturday, May 21, 2016. This 5 Miler is to benefit the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia. Not only is this a new race for the area, it will also take you along a different course than most traditional races!

Children are also invited to submit T-shirt designs in a contest for the Kids’ Fun Run. For non-runners, there will also be a 1-Mile Walk and fundraiser cycling class being sponsored by Flywheel at their Bryn Mawr studio on Thursday, May 19. For more details and to register or sponsor, please visit www.5forCHOP.org.

The 5forCHOP will support two research areas that are unique to Children’s Hospital and in need of more funding: The Center for Applied Genomics (CAG) and Evans syndrome clinical research:

Supporting The Center for Applied Genomics (CAG)

Since its founding in 2006, the Center for Applied Genomics at CHOP has studied the genetic causes of complex pediatric disorders. These include: ADHD, asthma, autism, cancer, inflammatory bowel disease, obesity, schizophrenia and type 1 diabetes. Developments in genetic technology afford further opportunities to identify new and better ways to diagnose and treat these illnesses.

Within the CAG is the comprehensive “1,000 Rare Diseases Project” which aims to accelerate the discovery of genetic variants underlying rare diseases. Researchers are one-third of the way toward their goal of sequencing 1,000 rare diseases. In the U.S., a disease is considered rare if it affects fewer than 200,000 people. Approximately 1 in every 12 newborn children will have a rare disease and most tend to be serious and lifelong. Individually, each disease affects a small percentage of the population, but in total, according to the National Institutes of Health (NIH), rare diseases affect close to 30 million Americans.

Improving the Treatment of Childhood Evans Syndrome

Evans syndrome is a rare autoimmune disease that can affect children and adults. In Evans syndrome, the immune syndrome attacks normal blood cells causing anemia, risk of overwhelming infections and increased bleeding and bruising. According to Dr. David Teachey M.D. and Director of Evans Syndrome Clinical Research at CHOP, “These children spend lots of time in the doctor’s office and in the hospital. They often need very strong medicines that do not work very well and have lots of side effects.” Very little is known about what causes Evans syndrome or the best way to treat it.

Because it is rare, very few doctors specialize in the care of Evans syndrome patients and very few researchers study it and develop new treatments. Teachey said, “At CHOP we are different. We have been studying Evans syndrome for over a decade and have doctors who are considered some of the experts in the world at diagnosing and treating childhood Evans syndrome. Our research takes place both in the laboratory and in clinical trials: Real bench to bedside research.” Funds raised will support new clinical trials to help children with Evans syndrome and other similar autoimmune diseases.